...I have:
4 cats
3 kids
2 carpet layers
1 dog with diarrhea
The next time I buy carpet, remind me to check the school calendar so that the little heathens will at least be occupied elsewhere. The cats are fairly happy to be closed up in my bedroom for the day. And the dog? Clearly her present condition is some sort of karmic retribution for some unspeakable act that I can't even remember performing. I swear to god, if she lives through her digestive distress I may have to kill her anyway. All the way dead.
What sort of God gives you brand new carpet and a 75-pound dog who can't control her bowels--on exactly the same day?
I don't think I told you guys yet, but the State of Washington sent me a shiny new teaching certificate. For the past month I've been substituting for my local school district. This, coupled with my work-at-home paralegal position, means that I've been working nearly full time for the past month. I don't know how some of you do it, seriously. I'm spent. But at least I can afford a couple of rooms' worth of new carpet (and maybe even some doggy Peptobismol...).
Really, you would expect this sort of thing in America, but in England? Oh, my.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090131/ap_on_re_eu/eu_britain_no_apostrophe_2
I think I mentioned that my neighbor Judith and I rescued a feral cat and her litter of kittens from a local park this summer. I currently have two of these kittens as permanent members of our household. We found other homes for all of the other kittens with one exception. We kept trying to find a home for Murray, but Judith decided to make her November birthday the deadline. If Murray hadn't found a "forever home" by then, Judith would offer him a permanent position in her own home. As it turned out, at the end of that month Judith contacted all the local businesses that had put up signs on Murray's behalf. He was no longer available for adoption. He was Judith's cat now and forever.
That left the mom cat: Nori. Although we had hoped that she would adjust to an indoor life, such was not to be. And that's the problem with feral cats, at least adult feral cats. If they were never socialized in their kitten days, what's to become of them? Realistically, there are only two choices. One is to trap them and humanely euthanize them. The other is to trap them, sterilize them, inoculate them against common cat diseases, and release them back into their original territory. This second option does nothing to protect them from predators or the elements, but it does give them the opportunity to live our their lives in what they consider "normal" conditions without contributing further to the on-going feral cat problem.
Although Nori had established relationships with select human beings, she didn't adjust to being kept indoors. We were hopeful at first. She let us pet her (almost unheard of for feral cats) and would even purr in response! But once we started sending her kittens away to their own homes, she lost all faith in us. She continues to live in Judith's home, but is clearly unhappy being there.
In the meantime, I spent all autumn volunteering at a local farm that has been turned into a historical site. We hosted first grade and sixth grade students there from September through December. My main station was the chicken coop. We told the 6-year-olds that, had they lived on the farm 100 years ago, they might have been in charge of taking care of the chickens. We gave them a flavor of what that might have been like. They fed the chickens. They collected eggs. They learned how to candle them. And all that time, I kept half an eye on the original 1897 barn across the pasture. What a shame, I thought, that there were no animals housed there now. And what a fine opportunity, I thought, for a barn cat.
At the end of the season, one of the museum staff mentioned (with great revulsion) that she had seen a rat run under the chicken coop. I decided the time was right. I went home and wrote up Nori's resume and sent it on to the museum. I don't think the director had ever seen a feline resume. This is what I wrote:
"My neighbor and I rescued this cat along with her 7 (!) kittens from Isaac Evans park this summer. The mom cat had a bit of a "fan club" who had been providing her with extra food for months, so, although feral, she had established some relationships with select humans. In fact, it was one of these people who picked her up for us and put her in a crate after we had live-trapped the kittens (she wasn't going to fall for our trap herself).The same person told us that mom cat had been born in the park the previous summer.
* Nori is only about 18 months old and in excellent health
* She is now spayed, so would not be contributing any kittens
* She will not be attracting the attentions of mischievous or destructive tom cats
* She has all her shots, so should not contract or spread any serious diseases
* Although she had been receiving some food at the park, we know she is an excellent hunter
* She is very savvy about avoiding predators, having kept herself and her kittens safe and healthy during their free-roaming days (all the kittens survived and now have permanent homes)
* She would make herself scarce when visitors come to the farm, but would probably establish a relationship with [caretaker] Stan (or whoever filled her food &water dishes regularly).
* And, she's a very attractive black cat with white markings (she didn't have a fan club for nothing!)
(Veterinary records are, of course, available)
"My neighbor continues to foster Nori in her home, but, even after several months, Nori is clearly unhappy with what she thinks is unnatural confinement. I think that life as a barn cat would be a perfect situation for Nori, providing her a bit more safety and security than she had in her feral days, while giving her the opportunity to roam and hunt in the manner she would clearly prefer. Mostly though, I think she would be an excellent match for the farm's requirements should you guys decide to go with a barn cat.
"Sorry about the length of this, Boss. I just wanted to put her resume in writing so that you would know of Nori's interest should the job come open.
"Thanks for considering her,
Kristy "
Guess what? She got the job! We get to take her to the farm next week. Please wish us luck in helping Nori make the transition to her new life.
Wow, the Esperantists found that post really quickly, and I appreciate their input and supportive comments. So, being on a roll, I think I will give another brief sermon from my Esperanto soapbox.
Let me tell you a little story. When I was in junior high school, I took a year of Spanish. Although I didn't take any foreign language courses in high school, I decided to pursue a bachelor of arts degree in college. Essentially, it was the same thing as a bachelor of science degree, only with an additional two-year foreign language requirement. Having a shallow familiarity with Spanish (based on my hazy junior high memories), I decided to take first and second year Spanish in college.
Flash forward (mumble-number-mumble) years. We now find Kristy employed by the King County Library System, one of the largest circulating libraries in the country. Many of our patrons were non-native, non-English speakers. For the first time in my life, I found those two years of college level Spanish being put to occasional good use. Even after two years of study, I hadn't learned all the verb tenses that exist in Spanish, so I wasn't entirely comfortable risking making a fool of myself in another person's native language. Nevertheless, more often than not, I took that risk and was largely able to communicate, as awkward as those conversations often were. And I felt very proud of myself for stepping out of my comfort zone and doing what I could to help those patrons use our services.
Then, a few minutes later, another recent immigrant would step up to my desk. Although I didn't speak Russian, I recognized it as the language that this person was using. And I couldn't help her. I'd have to get a translator on the phone from our central branch or resort to an online program such as Babblefish in order to attempt to communicate. This encounter didn't leave me feeling nearly as warm and fuzzy.
Then, within the hour, another patron would step up and attempt to communicate in yet another language--one that I might or might not have even been able to recognize.
The diversity of our local population was further reflected in the foreign language collections at each library branch. In mine, we had books and movies in more than a dozen languages. Spanish, yes. Russian. Hindi. Tagalog. Chinese and Vietnamese. A few French titles. Swahili and more. And people, those titles circulated. There was a far greater demand than I would have ever imagined before working in this setting.
The same year that I was working at the library, my daughter entered middle school for the first time. I was all the more committed to the idea of language study after my experiences at the library. True, there was no way that any one person could learn all the languages spoken regularly in our local community, but any small bit we could do to foster an understanding of other cultures is clearly even more essential for kids growing up today. I remembered Spanish, German, and French as being the only choices when I entered middle school. I wondered what sort of additional languages might be available to my daughter.
What I soon found out was that she had zero choices. Zip. NO foreign languages were even offered at the middle school level. In the heart of King County, alive with so many different languages, our children are losing their best opportunity of ever becoming fluent in another language by being denied the opportunity to study one when their brains are young and malleable enough to eventually achieve such a goal.
Today, my daughter is in high school. It's a bit late as far as I'm concerned, but she's finally being offered foreign language electives. Her choices? Spanish, French, German. And Japanese--the same choices I had all those years ago with the single addition of Japanese. While this is a start, thinking back to my experiences both at the library and as a sometimes-tutor of ELL students, I realize that no one ever approached me with an attempt to speak French. Or German. Or Japanese. Spanish, yes. But otherwise, people from these countries either aren't here or had access to enough English education before their arrival that communication is not an issue for them.
What I observe is that here in America (or at least in King County), there is a HUGE disconnect in languages we deem worthy of study by our children (mostly those spoken by white Europeans), and those that surround us everyday (those spoken by nearly everybody else). Is this racist? Or merely a reflection of the frustration I myself felt in never being able to learn such a stew of complicated and sometimes obscure languages? I hope that it's the latter. But then the question becomes, what can we do to address this issue of multiple languages being employed in the same setting? How will we ever learn to communicate when it is impossible for any one person to learn them all? Do we stomp our feet and stubbornly insist that "If you plan to come to America, you'd better damn well learn the English language!" (as difficult and irrational as English can be)? How's that working out so far? Consider southern California before you answer.
This is exactly the reason why an easily learned, mutual second language (such as Esperanto) is so desirable. Yet I can understand why so many people haven't thought about it in these terms. I grew up in Oregon, where the only foreign language we ever heard in the streets was Spanish. If you wanted to communicate with people of other cultures in your neighborhood, you studied Spanish; problem solved. Now, however, both here in Washington and on my visits home to Oregon, there are people among us from dozens of other countries. And if it's happening here, it's happening across the country as a whole. So, is Esperanto a quaint novelty that will never catch on? Or is it a possible solution whose time may have finally come?
That's right, baby. This year I have resolved to learn Esperanto. Why, you ask. Why? Trust me, there are more reasons than you have time to read. The first, however, was that we had a dinner table discussion last month about obscure languages. My husband posited that he would rather learn Klingon than Esperanto because at least he could use Klingon to impress people at Star Trek conventions (although not to pick up chicks, I reminded him, as speaking Klingon in public is the next best thing to the joining the priesthood to ensure a lifetime of celibacy). While he considered that, my daughter wanted to know all about Esperanto. I couldn't tell her much, other than that it is an artificial language created in the late 1800's with the Utopian goal of being the official second language of everyone on Earth (so that we could all finally communicate on an equal footing). I also knew that it was created for ease of learning, with literally no irregular forms or arbitrary exceptions to grammatical rules. My daughter, currently enrolled in first year Japanese, recognized these attributes as being highly desirable (or "freaking cool" in the parlance of her peers). After dinner, she and I researched Esperanto quite a bit further and decided it was too freaking awesome to not at least attempt to learn. Dude. Why not? Seriously.
In other news (there's been news?), I placed an order today for Adobe Dreamweaver. And, if you recognize that as the premiere web design software on the market today, you'll know what that portends. Yes, I will be building my own website again in the near future. But here's the tragedy: My old domain name (XXXX panda.com) has been co-opted by a domain squatter and is no longer available. That means I'm going to have to come up with something new. And, as you may have noticed, I'm a bit Amish when it comes to embracing change. It's a good thing the software won't be arriving for a week or so because I'm going to need some time to think about this.
I was reading a friend's blog tonight and she was talking about budgeting, specifically the household food budget. I've been mostly out of the workforce for a couple of years now and, not bring in any money to the house, have felt it's now my duty to stretch the dollars my husband makes. The best things I've done so far are in not throwing away the food we have because it expires (we're talking mostly leftovers here) before anyone becomes desparate enough to eat it. Case in point: old, blackened, mooshy bananas. I know people who will use these to whip up a tasty batch of banana bread. The problem I have is that inspiration for baking doesn't always strike when I notice the bananas on the counter starting to ooze through their skins. Solution: peel each banana and put into individual sandwich baggies to freeze. The will keep in the freezer nearly forever, and are the perfect base for slushy fruit smoothies. Another mostly wasted item? Bread heels. No one here seems to like them, so, unless I have the energy to toss them into the woods behind our house for the squirrels, into the garbage they go. Now I instead air dry them thorougly, run them through the blender and use the resulting crumbs in a couple of ways. First, I use them for homemade coating mix (Shake n Bake) by adding onion soup mix and/or other seasonings. Second, I have a falafel recipe that calls for a big dose of bread crumbs, so I'm always ready to fry up a batch. I usually splurg for the good, grainy, seedy bread so I'm pleased to have a use for the otherwise undesirable pieces too. Also, we very rarely take the kids out to restaurants anymore. This means, with most of our dinners prepared at home, we have a lot more leftovers in our fridge than we used to, both meat and dribs and drabs of vegetables. Once a week I used to round up this stuff from the fridge and throw it out, but then I found a recipe for Shepard's Pie. I take a pound of ground beef and then grind up whatever leftover meat I have in the fridge with my mixer's grinding attachment. This usually gives me a pound and a half of meat (which is what the recipe calls for). Then I can add whatever vegetables are at hand--fresh or leftovers--to make the base. Top that with a layer of shredded cheese and top the cheese with a layer of mashed potatoes and bake the hell out of it. It's a little different everytime, but always a winner with the kids. And I don't throw away nearly as much leftover food as I used to. For fresh vegetables in danger of exceeded their shelf life, I bought a wok and stir fry them all up with nuts, a bit of meat, and a pot of rice. In short, I'm making better use of the appliances that I already have to make better use of the food and finding key recipes here and there that make better use of the things we are otherwise reluctant to eat. If you have any advice found by stretching your own food dollars, I'd be pleased to hear it.
On Friday, I took the dog to the vet to have her stitches out. Long story, that. The short version is that she ran over a shard of broken glass the week before and had to be sewn back together. To the tune of $350. Ouch. On so many levels, ouch. So by Friday morning, we both had a healthy dose of cabin fever. With the vet's okay, we drove directly down to Brannan Park on the Green River for our first walk in about ten days.
This particular trail is ideal for a warm-up after a prolonged stay indoors. The trail follows the river through the park and beyond it for another half mile or so. And, because the trail simply dead-ends at that point, it's a bit of a trail-to-nowhere, so not heavily used. I can let the dog off the leash without having to worry too much about encountering other people/animals. It's short, it's quiet, it's scenic. What more could you want on a misty Friday morning?
Walking past the park, the first thing I noticed was a helicopter. It was hovering directly over the river, not moving at all. That was odd enough, but then I noticed another one further downriver, also standing sentry over the water. And then another beyond that. As we kept walking, we eventually noticed a full complement of sheriffs' vehicles parked along the road across the river, lights flashing red. And then the rescue boats in the water, probing the bottom of the rain-engorged river with long poles.
As we turned about at the far end of the trail, there were so many people standing about on the trail that I gave up the idea of letting the dog walk off-leash. There was even a KING 5 camera crew interviewing neighbors who'd come out of their houses for a closer look. I asked one of them what was going on. A car, she told me, had lost control and ended up in the river. The driver got out, but there were still two boys in the car. How long had they been underwater. Oh, at least a couple of hours.
We came home and I turned on the news. If you're local, you probably already know what happened, but for those of you at large, a 16-year-old girl was driving her 2-year-old cousin to day care for her aunt (who was recovering from knee surgery). Another 13-year-old cousin was along for the ride (why?). The day care wouldn't take the baby because he was sick, so the kids were heading home when the driver lost control on the wet and windy road and found herself in the river. She was able to get free of the car, but she was swept away when she tried to get back to the boys. And then the car disappeared below the surface. Distraught, she flagged down a passing car and was taken to the hospital. Law enforcement eventually found the car about 100 yards downriver from where it entered the water. The river was so high and strong that they had no visibility and couldn't even attach chains to the car to pull it out. The current was so strong the divers couldn't even keep their regulators in place.
The family has been holding a vigil at the riverbank ever since. They vow not to leave until their boys are pulled out of the river. Today divers finally managed to get chains on the car (probably at great personal risk--but with several inches of rain due tomorrow, the pressure was on). The baby was still in his car seat, but no sign of the 13-year-old's body. The family's vigil continues.
About 100 yards from the accident site (the same place they originally located the car in the river), on the same road, sits the Mary Olson Farm. The farm remained in the same family for nearly 75 years (from its establishment in 1895). In its remote and sheltered valley, it has remained largely untouched by time. The farm house still has never had plumbing nor electricity. The city acquired this unique property several years ago and has been in the process of turning it into a historical/heritage site, an interpretative center illustrating the sort of family farm that was the backbone of our area's settlement.
Since this school year began, I've been a volunteer facilitator of the school district field trips to the Mary Olson Farm. We began the year with first grade field trips, talking about our food and where it comes from. We've had the past week off and will now transition to sixth grade field trips which feature stream ecology and the life cycle of salmon (there are two salmon runs in Olson Creek each fall). The first of the sixth grade classes will be on site tomorrow. This means at some point the friends and classmates of the boy still missing in the river will ride a school bus directly through the vigil by the river--the tents and the grief and the media and all--to get to the farm. How do they possibly focus on ecology and fish after something like that?
I've been preoccupied with this situation all weekend. Mostly I think about the girl who was driving the car. I too got my driver's license when I was 16. It seems like most people who got their licenses at that age have some tale of stupidity and bad judgment to tell about their first year of driving. In my case, I totaled a car and put the life of a good friend in danger. Still, I was lucky. This girl is going to have to live her entire life with the knowledge that two children lost their lives to her inexperience.
What an incredible, tragic waste.
